Glow Up Your Home: Essential Hygge Lighting Ideas You’ll Love
It’s been a while since I’ve even thought about hygge though circa 2015/2016, it was one of my favourite words. Everyone wanted a hygge lifestyle. It was all about seeking a certain level of coziness and comfort (a much sweeter version of bed rot) but with a focus on aesthetics such as beautiful wool blankets, mason jars with spruce linings, messy candles, wooden bowls, and effortlessly dewy skin. Your goal was to look like you lived in a windmill. It is the tone Blake Lively was trying to set with her 2014 lifestyle site Preserve (oh Blake, remember when that failing was your biggest problem?). I also love Hygge because it led me to the Scottish phrase: Hurkle-Durkle which means “to lie in bed or lounge about when one should be up and about”. Hygge walked so Hurkle-Durkle could run.
It also had a lovely aspect of encouraging you not to focus on the growing dependence and fascination with technology that was happening. But this was back in the pre-pandemic days where you could still survive without being glued to your phone and we didn’t have robots all over our house helping us order groceries. TikTok wasn’t even an embryo of an idea yet. Maybe it was the pandemic then set us back or maybe we just accepted that we are all addicted to doom scrolling and BRAT summer certainly didn’t help.
But the good news is hygge still lives on our lighting choices. If you’re anything like me then lighting in your home can literally make or break your spirit. And you have to figure the Danish people are experts at this considering they are in darkness for the majority of the year.
The theory behind hygge light is subtle but powerful. You want to emulate the lighting of lamps and candles so lower is better. Now this may not be the best lighting if you need to read complicated documents but if you are relaxing at home, hygge lighting should be considered. Lærke Møller wrote on the Shop Hygge Box blog, “The soft, golden hue of candles mimics the warmth of the sun, which is in short supply during colder months. This type of lighting is proven to help us relax, boost our mood, and make us feel more at ease. It’s no wonder that Danes, who are regularly ranked among the happiest people in the world, swear by the power of candles to cultivate a hygge lifestyle.”
So if you are ready for lighting that cannot be simply dubbed as mood lighting but as lighting to truly make you happier here are a few tips:
4 Tips for Perfect Hygge Lighting
Hang String Lights
Due to their size, they are a bit less aggressive than a lamp or overhead lighting (that makes you feel like you are back in school.) Plus they are festive!
Dimmable Lights
If you can get dimmable lights and just leave them a little low, this can be super relaxing and the perfect atmosphere for candles.
Candles
There are so many articles on the perfect hygge candles but it seems Møller suggests that beeswax or soy candles are your best bet and you should set them up in clusters, with textiles or in places you wouldn’t normally find a candle (but be smart with that last one.)
Low-Temperature Bulbs
Look for bulbs with a low Kelvin rating (around 1800K) that emit a soft, yellow light that will emulate a fire.